


Every water goes to the sea

by Mikirise



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, M/M, Tales of Altea Fanzine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-06
Updated: 2019-02-06
Packaged: 2019-10-23 11:18:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17682437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mikirise/pseuds/Mikirise
Summary: "We went to the river, you and me" Lance begins to tell. "And we had a nice afternoon. We dueled,” he counts on his fingers, “we ate, we run. We talked about your father and my father and then I told you that, in Veradero, Consuelo and I did swimming competitions and I always won. And you told me you would have defeated me, of course, because you are the worst person in the world. And I told you no. You can beat me in duels with the sword, and you can fight me in greek-roman fights, even if not always, but swim? I was born in the water. You couldn't defeat me. And so I challenged you. And you accepted the challenge. Do you remember? " he asks. He lays his hands on the trunk of the tree on which they're sitting. "How can you always forget everything?"Keith shakes his head slowly.





	Every water goes to the sea

**Author's Note:**

> My contribution to Tales of Altea fanzine.

  
  
  
  
There are two versions of Keith and Lance's first meeting. One of these versions is false, but Lance believes it is true. One of these versions is true, but only Keith remembers it.   
  
Lance sits next to him, in the darkness of the night lit only by their fire. He takes off his boots with fluid movements, then sighs with relief, stretching his back with his arms raised. He is looking at Keith, and Keith instead has his gaze focused on the tip of his sword, and his eyebrows furrowed. There is silence between them. Neither has talked in the last hours. The only sounds that fill the day were the crackling of the fire lit by Keith and the bubbling of the river next to which they decided to stop. Keith returns Lance's gaze only a few seconds later, when he started to swing, giving him some shove. He wants his attention. And he has that smile on his lips. The same smile he has had for years. The same smile. No matter what. Always the same. Keith sighs and nods.   
  
The first time they met, according to Lance, they were five years old, and they had a pact between families to be honored. Keith observes him in silence, when he tells their adventures as children to strangers, met in a tavern, or in the woods. Lance laughs when he tells their story. Most of the time he rolls his eyes and has this half-smile on his lips, with the dimple on his right cheek, which makes him look younger than he is, more innocent than Keith knows he is. He says their first words were not kind. Keith was a solitary and troubled child, but not out of malice. Lance always lifts a finger at this point in his speech, to highlight the point. It doesn't matter if he is talking to a traveler, a merchant, a prince, a spirit of the forest, a knight or a magician. He tells their account always the same way, without ever losing his enthusiasm, without ever missing a single detail. It looks like a choreographed dance that Keith didn't want to learn. No, Lance repeats to his listeners, when he has, Keith was a troubled kid because he never knew how to communicate with words. And it must be frustrating, he says. Must be frustrating not being good socializing in a castle. He disappeared between the walls. Nobody looked at him during the banquets. This has to be one of the reasons why his family looked for an alliance. It would have been politically convenient, and an advantage for their little son.   
  
“What?” Keith grumbles and Lance shrugs. “Lance” he scolds irritated.   
  
Lance turns his head, and he's no longer looking at him. He's looking at the river that flows a few meters from them. And now, he is the one focused on something else. Keith watches him while he smiles and turns towards him. "I remembered, you know?" he says after a few seconds. "Our trip. When we were younger. "   
  
Keith swallows. He clenches his fists and shoulders. And he doesn't know what to say.   
  
Lance always tells stories about his beloved Veradero and how he spent his first five years there. He talks about his sisters. He talks about his brothers. He talks about two parents and a grandmother. His face lights up when he mentions them. He talks about his brother Luis, who taught him to ride. And then he talks about a certain Marco, another brother, who must have taught him to shoot with his bow. And then, he says, yes, he has a sister. Veronica. She spent her time climbing trees and stealing apples from the garden, just to make the gardener angry. And, he always says, we are four brothers. But then he talks about a sister named Consuelo who had drawn the map of a castle, with all its secret passages, and he spent entire mornings with her, laughing, joking. Were not you just four brothers? Keith sometimes asks him, interrupting his stories, and Lance gives him an empty look, his head tilted to a side, as if for a few moments he has stopped working. Then he smiles again. He keeps speaking as if Keith had not asked anything. He says oh, it's been a long time since I saw Veradero the last time. And he has that sad expression, that homesickness that maybe Keith cannot prove. And that makes him feel heavier.   
  
"Our trip?" he asks in a low voice, after clearing his throat. "Which one?"   
  
Lance pulls his shoulders forward, resting his elbows on his legs. "The one to the river" answers as if it were obvious. "Before Shiro's abduction. That - we had fourteen summers. I had. I had fourteen springs and I told you in Veradero there's the ocean and you said here instead there are only rivers and no one has ever really seen the ocean. Do you remember? And I told you a river is a good compromise.”   
  
Keith gives him an empty look. He leaves the sword aside and nervously bites the inside of his cheeks. "And what did we do?" he asks again.   
  
According to Lance's version, the two of them, Keith from the Kogane family and Lance Charles McClain, grew up together. It's a tradition. Noble families create a social network to rely on, through the exchange of children. They needed an alliance between their families and Lance is the youngest among his brothers. He was sent to the Koganes, an unpredictable and not with the best of reputations family. Lance was the most expendable.    
  
When he says it aloud, he almost always shrugs. He uses his playful tone. It doesn't matter. And anyway, he adds, thanks to this alliance, he met his greatest rival, as well as his best friend. And when he says it, he always smiles quickly at Keith. Then comes back to his story.    
  
If Shiro -do you know who Shiro is? Shiro, their hero. Takashi Shirogane. You know? Takashi Shirogane, guys. That Shiro. Well, if he had not been kidnapped in these times of war, they would be in the battlefield, but the bright-haired Wizard Lotor, an annoying know-it-all, kidnapped him for the first time in the saddle a hippogriff. It seems that Shiro is the Champion, the king of kings, who will bring victory to the faction for which he will fight and so, finally, peace. But this is not the point, he says every time, in front of a mug of beer, or in front of the fire, clearing his throat. Their mission, of Keith and Lance, is to save Shiro, who now seems to be in the Metal Castle, kidnapped by Slav, the changeling. And at this point in the narrative, he always bursts out laughing. Because it's ridiculous, he explains. Every time they're this close to saving him, inexplicable things happen. And this must be Fate. Or maybe not. They are not the only riders to try to save Shiro, after all, and since they do not know each other, they always end up tripping over each other. And here's where he usually stops. There's nothing more to tell, he says.   
  
But, sometimes, he asks: why not collaborate with the other riders? For example, Allura, the horseman, why not ally with her, who also has magic and elementals on her side? Keith always rolls his eyes. He always liquidates it with few words. She is the daughter of the Elves, he says, and then nothing more. But there must be something else. With men there is always something else, Lance murmurs sometimes, and Keith feels his breath stopping every time, and then finds Lance's half-smile. He is no longer thinking about what he has just said.   
  
"We went to the river, you and me" Lance begins to tell. "And we had a nice afternoon. We dueled,” he counts on his fingers, “we ate, we run. We talked about your father and my father and then I told you that, in Veradero, Consuelo and I did swimming competitions and I always won. And you told me you would have defeated me, of course, because you are the worst person in the world. And I told you no. You can beat me in duels with the sword, and you can fight me in greek-roman fights, even if not always, but swim? I was born in the water. You couldn't defeat me. And so I challenged you. And you accepted the challenge. Do you remember? " he asks. He lays his hands on the trunk of the tree on which they're sitting. "How can you always forget everything?"   
  
Keith shakes his head slowly.   
  
"Yeah, long story short. We took off our clothes and got in the water. We started swimming, and we swam and we swam and then you won.” He shurgs. “Because an elemental, an ondine, I think, he grabbed my foot, dragging me down. And I tried to get away, to save myself, but the only thing I was thinking was I'm going to die drowning. Me. Drowning. In a river! The elemental kept dragging me down and I could no longer hold my breath. You don't remember? Really? My head was bursting, I was not breathing, and then you came. You kicked. You threw random kicks and punches and the elemental escaped and the elemental went away. You dragged me to the shore. I was breathing again. And I haven't stepped into the water since then.” He has his eyebrows arched, he strokes his forehead with two fingers and Keith observes him, with a clenched fist and the guilt that weighs on his chest. "Water was my home. A home I can't go back to."   
  
Keith puts his hand on his hand and squeezes it a bit. Just enough to remind him that he's still there. That remembers. That he is sorry. But, the truth is he doesn't have this memory. Because everything that Lance has told has never happened. "If you don't want to get into the water," he says softly. "You don't need to get into the water."   
  
Lance smiles at him and looks at the river, turning his hand to be able to weave their fingers together and, again, the same silence that accompanied them throughout the day falls. The fire crackles cheerfully and it looks like an inappropriate detail. Lance's face is not cheerful. Nothing should be cheerful, therefore.   
  
Lance knows something is wrong. Something that doesn't fit in his stories, maybe the number of his brothers, the reasons of his arrival in this land, or why Keith doesn't want to ally with Allura. He knows there is something wrong. And he knows something's been stolen from him. The problem is that he doesn't know what it is.   
  
The first time Keith and Lance met, Keith had fallen into a river after a fight with the Wizard, who had blinded him with his shield, knocking him off a rock. He had hit his head, several stones had scratched him all over his body and were dragged by the current, senseless. Keith has been saved by an elemental with bright eyes and a dimple on his right cheek. You can call me what you want, he had said, and he was playing with the water gushing from the ground, while Keith, with dripping hair and a bulky armor that had little to do with him, looked at him suspiciously. I haven't had a real name in centuries, the elemental had continued. And Keith had replied that he had no time. He had tried to stand up, but between the wounds in battle and those caused by the river, it had been difficult for him to move. He remained seated, with a growl on his lips as the elemental smiled. With its dimple on the cheek. With a smile that has not changed.   
  
"But if you want to," Keith says softly "If you want, you can go back. Into the water."   
  
He had told him, that first time, on the banks of the river, that he had lived a lot as an elemental. That he had observed the men, that he had seen them fight. Men against magicians, men against elves, against dwarfs, against witches, trolls, fairies, gnomes. Against men. He had seen them destroy his house. He had seen them destroy each other. They had done it for centuries, in a war in which too many people had lost their lives, for an idea of honor that they lost along the way. And yet. He knew there was something he could save. It must be a way to stop them that did not consist in the destruction of the whole species. He had heard of Shiro. I want to protect you in your search, he said, as long as once saved, this king of kings also protects my house. Keith had thinned his eyes. Allura has magic to protect her. Lotor is a magician. He could have had an elemental on his side. And then he said: I work alone. The elemental -Lance had laughed and followed him anyway.   
  
Lance smiles at him tenderly. "Are you sure?" he asks, raising his eyes to the sky full of stars, moving frantically, perhaps also struck by the war that here on earth, continues to be fought. "Do you remember when this war broke out?" He asks, with the corners of his lips turned down. "Because it seems a lifetime." He turns to him. "Perhaps, when all it's over, I will swim again, what do you think? Will you teach me again, as I taught you? Or, do you, think I've never really forgotten how to do it?"   
  
Keith blinks. Some stars suddenly turn off. They must have fallen. Disappeared.   
  
When did Lance lose his memory? When did Keith get used to it? When did he find the lie that Lance tells a place more inviting, nicer, more comfortable? When did he become so selfish that he preferred it to reality? "You didn't teach me anything," he replies.   
  
Lance laughs, stretching out his legs and trying to warm his feet. "I could teach you how to be a real child. With feelings and all. "   
  
Lance is deeply unhappy, with his memories halfway. He knows people who don't exist and who live in an invented country, and he seems completely insane, at Keith's eyes, who tries to stay silent while listening to him talk about an entire life that is not anywhere else but in his head. When he took the bow in his hand for the first time and said that he was the best archer in the world, with a hurt look, because Keith had to know, they grew up together, didn't they?, Keith was speechless while he felt his heart breaking. And he could forget everything because of Lance's smile when he hits a target. He could pretend all of this is true. He would not feel so guilty if it were not for those ghosts on Lance's shoulders reminding him there is a piece of him that they've lost. If Lance didn't write letters to non-existent people. If he didn't talk about them with a love that has no reason to be. If he didn't say: when I come home this thing I feel in my chest and that's not good -it will settle down. But Lance does speak of a certain Veradero and Keith is terrified one day he'll drag him to the borders of the kingdom to show him an ocean that perhaps isn't there, or a castle eaten by time, and skeletons instead of people. Ghosts. Ghosts invented by him, though.   
  
And, at the same time, he's terrified he'll remember that he hasn't always been Lance Charles McClain, and he'll sigh, he'll say his mission makes no sense, and he'll throw himself back into the water, without even looking back, leaving Keith there, on the bank, alone, with a sword in his hand and armor that doesn't suit him.   
  
There are legends about ondines who decide to live among men. These legends start with a pact, continue with a lost memory, and end with abandonment. And why Keith's story shouldn't follow the rules of legends?   
  
He tilts his head, leans it on Lance's shoulders, who snorts and puts his chin on his hair.    
  
When Lance looks at the water, he feels nostalgic, and Keith knows it, but he cannot say anything. He cannot fix anything they have broken. So he silently holds his hand and waits for this silent day to pass, as so many others have already passed.   
  
In the story that Lance tells, the two of them grew up together, they fought side by side, they participated along with those boring banquets of his father, they trained with the same weapons, becoming companions and friends, and Lance never thought, no for a moment in his life, to leave him behind, despite missing his family, even though he didn't know what his place in the world was. He says they overcome their difficulties together, together they won challenges and fights, and he will never leave Keith's side. Not even after the war. And it's such a beautiful lie that Keith would like to be able to forget the truth. He would like to think at an end of the war. He'd like to think of being able to live a period of peace, with Lance, after finding Shiro.   
  
The fire crackles cheerfully, while Lance sighs on Keith's hair, and the river gurgles a few meters away.   
  
And there are two versions of Keith and Lance's first meeting. A version is false, but Lance believes it's true, and he tells it to everyone, when he can, because he thinks it's funny. Lance was on his horse, he was five years old maybe. Keith was muddy and wet. And, of course, he was looking straight at Lance. He had lifted his chin and told him: Go away, I work alone. Then he stumbled on a rock and hurt his nose.   
  
It's fake, not real, and Keith knows it, but, oh, how much he would like it to be true.   
  



End file.
